Shane wants your thoughts on urban 40 zones

Minister for Territory and Municipal Services, Shane Rattenbury, today invited Canberrans to provide feedback in relation to the 40 kilometre per hour (40 km/h) speed limit precincts in the Civic, Belconnen and Tuggeranong town centres.

“Following the successful introduction of reduced speed limit precincts in Gungahlin and Woden last year, 40 km/h precincts were expanded to the Civic, Belconnen and Tuggeranong town centres in June 2013,” Mr Rattenbury said.

“The slower speed environments were introduced to improve safety for all road users and, in particular, help make travel in town centres safer and more comfortable for pedestrians, cyclists and other vulnerable road users.”

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The precincts in each of the three town centres were identified as suitable locations due to high pedestrian movements and a minimum of 400 metres of retail and commercial development.

Mr Rattenbury said the ACT Government has commenced an evaluation of the 40 km/h speed precinctsin Belconnen, Civic and Tuggeranong which have now been in place for around six months on a fulltimebasis (24 hours a day, seven days a week).

“In addition to conducting speed and traffic volume surveys at each town centre, the Government is seeking community feedback on the effectiveness of these reduced speed limits in improving safety for vulnerable road users.

“I encourage local residents and traders, to take the time to have their say on the introduction of these precincts,” Mr Rattenbury concluded.

How can you claim these areas are a “success”? What is success and failure being measured against? If someone gets hit by a car do they say “well that’s a failure, let’s undo the changes”.
As others have said already, the speeds in these areas were already low due to all sorts of reasons. The additions of the inverted potholes have now slowed traffic to <10km/h. But alas, they won't get ripped up because its Shane's master plan to play traffic controller like a big boy.

Maybe the CBD would have more sensible traffic if they got around to installing a proper North-South bypass. It needn’t be perfect and could be cobbled together from a combination of existing roads and new ones, but it needs to be figured out soon. Northbourne Ave is a mess that belongs in a city a quarter the size, it takes an hour to get along it during peak.

I think it comes down to whether or not people were already going that speed. In Gungahlin on hibberson street, nobody ever really goes above 40 because of all the pedestrian crossings, intersections and the narrow road not allowing much traffic flow, especially with lights at the end and people turning every which way. So there, it’s not such a big deal. Although at 4am driving through there at 40kph is probably slightly annoyingly slow but you generally wouldn’t need to go through there because everything there would be closed anyway.

But London circuit is unnecessary. People go faster than 40kph there because there’s no good reason for it to be 40kph. It seems to drag on endlessly at 40kph without any justification for it. For policies like this, I think the best approach is making decisions on an evidence basis. You shouldn’t arbitrarily reduce speed limits for no reason. If there is a large quantity of pedestrians being hit by cars at that location AND it turns out that the reason for it is because they were going too fast (within the speed limit) to stop in time, THEN you should reduce the speed limit. You don’t reduce the limit because it’s “safer” for no reason. That being said, I do have a lot of praise for this consultation phase. At least Shane is trying it and seeing if it works and hopefully if there is no or very minimal safety increase, then he will reverse the decision. That at least builds further evidence for the future. If it was lowered without the number of pedestrian car accidents decreasing, and subsequently the limit was increased with no effect, then the evidence very clearly demonstrates that the limit is appropriate. I will be somewhat annoyed however if the consultation and the evidence of accidents both say that the limit decrease on London Circuit was unnecessary but he then leaves it in place. That would be a waste of everyone’s time.

I agree about the speed bumps but if you contrast this with London Circuit where there are no speed humps, the speed limit for most drivers continues to be 60. I cross London Circuit right outside of the police station and one would have thought that with a new regime in place they would make the effort to have a go at policing it. Easy money one would have thought seeing as most drivers ignore the signs.

Can’t complain about the 40 zones, in post places the traffic was already doing 40 in practice, the problem is the damn speed cushions they’ve installed like between Homeworld the the Hyperdome, which in effect make the 40 zone a 10 zone and gives your spine a nice realignment.

+1. The 40 zones are a good thing, although traffic generally moved at <40km/h around these areas already. The speed cushions are a joke, with many treating them as a challenge. My 'blue bogan ute of death' can only get over them at a crawl anyway (less than 5km/h). Meanwhile P-platers and SUV/4WD owners see them as a challenge and (literally) INCREASE their speed for them. I have on more than one occasion seen 4WD's hit them at 40km/h or faster, going around cars that are in the process of crawling over them.

Can’t complain about the 40 zones, in post places the traffic was already doing 40 in practice, the problem is the damn speed cushions they’ve installed like between Homeworld the the Hyperdome, which in effect make the 40 zone a 10 zone and gives your spine a nice realignment.

I think they are a massive win, since we have had them I don’t think there was any pedestrian fatalities in those areas, they have also stopped the attacks from wild bears and tigers. These 40 zones are outstanding!